Ghostbusters (Margot)

Margot
Two days ago, Margot had a very bad time that ended with the doc giving her a one-on-one demonstration of how his Work happened-- complete with a little portable lab-and-medicine kit.  She got to see him whip up a potion to heal himself, but unfortunately wasn't in much of a state to be studious and ask questions and take notes.  That was a pretty bad time, and one that she had told Ned to about (in only moderate detail).  About how a goblin was trying to abduct people but The Doc got in the way and she tried to help but they both just got a bunch of claws in them before The Doc basically tazed the thing's nerves and made it run away.

Wizards.  Mad Scientists.  Ghosts.  Now Goblins too.

And hey, speaking of ghosts...  That haunting at the frat house wasn't ever resolved, was it?

One thing led to another, and the phone call eventually ended with one apprentice convincing the other to agree to a date and a location.  They were going to go back.  Perhaps try to solve a mystery.  Like they were a part of Scooby Doo's gang or something.

This is how they came to stand outside of the same frat house on this particular evening.  The temperatures were mild (for winter, it was still cold of course) and snow was falling in big fluffy flakes from a heavy blanket of clouds above.  Margot was standing outside on the sidewalk, looking at the building with her nose wrinkled up in disdain.  She didn't necessarily want to be here (it wasn't hard to imagine which of the two argued for coming here tonight).  She was wrapped up in her brown coat, with a scarf around her neck and up over her head as well.  She was wearing a dress under the coat, the dark green skirt stopped just above her knees, which peeked bare for an inch or two before stockings and boots took over the job of keeping her covered and warm.

There wasn't a party tonight like there had been when Margot and Makayla were there, but this was a frat house, and it was Saturday night.  Even if there wasn't a proper party going on, any number of college-aged persons could likely be found within.  The doors were always open on Friday and Saturday nights.

"Well," she said.  "I guess we go in?"

Ned
Always open.

Fridays and Saturdays, you got a taste of it. Something worth belonging to or being a part of. That was what Frats did. They made you something. Someone. Made you into a better part of the greater whole and KAPPA KAPPA PHIII-....or some such nonsense. Ask Ned what he thought about the entire thing and he would probably tell you it was an elaborate masturbation ritual meant to celebrate the male ego.

But then how to explain sororities?

They stood outside the Frat House, who's windows were dark and doors were closed. There were a few lights on in the windows of the first floor,  but the porch was dark, the house number obscured in the shadow. Plastic cups and stains were visible on the chipped porch paint while the faint hum of thump of heavy base could be heard from neighbouring frat houses nearby. Still, it was quiet. A solemnity that spoke of something off about a normally 'Kickin neigbourhood'.

His hands in his jacket pockets, long coat hung to the knees, collar up and neck pulled in to keep the wintry chill off his face, he didn't turn to look at her at first, gauging the House with careful scrutiny. At last, the snowfall forcing a vague shiver through him, he turned a stare over the collar of the jacket.

"Let me get this straight. You had a House full of frat boys at a party, who went apeshit and started attacking you because of a Ghost possessing them. Yeah? And now want to give going inside another shot for a repeat performance?"

A pause. Incredulous, disbelieving, judging, take your pick.

"Have you checked the place yet to see what issues there might be? If any? I really don't want to get possessed."

Margot
The incredulous stare and question was met with an upward hop of eyebrows and a small shrug.  She supposed he had a good point, and looked back to the house again.

"I don't really want you to get possessed either.  It'd be a shame to have to smash your head in with a fire extinguisher, too."

If he looked at her for that comment he'd find her smirking, just a little.  Grim humor, but wasn't that the best kind of humor for a night like this?  They weren't here for the weed, cheap liquor, and filthy matresses.  They were here to try and resolve a haunting, whatever it was that might take.

"Well, no, I suppose.  I only had time to figure out that there was a ghost responsible for what all was happening, but by that point an exit was in sight so we just bailed.  I tried to stay away after that.  But now..."

A particular chill in the wind had Margot shivering as well, and she tugged her scarf further over her hair and toward her forehead.  "There's probably something to be learned here."

She thought for a moment, then inquired:  "Do you suppose we should walk around it then?  See what we can see without having to walk through the door?"

Ned
"That could work..."

Ned receives the bit of grim Humour with something like...practical acceptance. If it came down to that, he didn't doubt that Margot seemed willing to cave his skull in. By that same token, Ned probably felt the same way. A vice versa 'Sorry we walked into this, gonna brain you now for my own personal safety'. His own attention returns to the frat house, inspecting the higher windows and their darkness, then the lower floors themselves.

"It's pretty quiet for a Saturday night." He pulls his hand from his pocket, phone blinking to life. He keys in his passcode and begins to flip open apps, even as he takes a few steps toward the House's right side.

"C'mon..."



* * * *

The House towers above them. Three stories (four including the basement) of aging victorian brick. Converted decades ago, it probably served as an estate house of some sort or another before being bought up by the appropriate authorities and delivered into the hands of the University. Tall windows with thin eaves, present a sense of fortification while the thick brick reinforces the sense that the place could take and handle a sustained siege if the occupants were prepared.

All the better perhaps, to withstand the destructive appetites of many Frats.

They pass the porch and the sheer surface of the walls, sprout ivy and climbing morning glory, too stubborn to die in the winter chill. Or at least, show that death was knocking. The leaves are withered and gone while the punishing weather on campus had made the brick faded and chipped with time. Each window they pass beneath is a solid six feet off the ground, making it a jump and climb if either of them wanted a view inside. They pass three on their way around to the building's Western face. The Fourth is the first of the window's they come to with a lamp light gleaming dully in it's curtained glass.

"...Shut down." Ned offers, glancing up from his phone. "Looks like after your party incident, some officials came through. Made the paper. Assault charges for some. Some memory loss. Victims naming names and saying weird things. Folks are blaming drugs and alcohol but...school board didn't take too kindly to Frat Boys hurting some girls." Ned looked up at the House. "Pretty heavy scrutiny in the news these days about that sort of stuff. They shut the place down until the charges could be sorted out...."

Margot
It was a cautious pace at which Margot walked forward, stepping off the sidewalk and onto the snow-crusted lawn.  Her boots would leave tracks in the snow, but she wasn't especially worried about that at this moment.  Willing enough to walk ahead on this, Margot stepped out to the front and began her walk around the house's edge.

The porch was just as stout and intimidating as the rest of the house was, and the ivy-crusted windows were too tall for her to be able to see through.  There didn't seem to be much to look at, though-- the windows were all dim and dark and no movement caught their eyes.

Well, except for the one on the very end, where dim light called through closed curtains.  Margot looked curiously up at this window and came to a stop standing directly beneath it, turned about to look at Ned instead while he spoke and relayed what he'd found on his phone screen.

"So then nobody should be here...," she said slowly, and looked back up at the window ledge above.  Let her eyes fall down to the brick wall beneath the window instead and furrowed her brow.  "I wonder what they'd be doing in there."

Then she looked quickly at Ned, like a thought occurred to her.  "Do you see a gap in the curtains?  Could you boost me up, I could peek through?"

Ned
"Dick fuckin' hardy to your Nancy shittin' drew..."

Ned offers by way of reply, moving closer to the wall. He tucks his phone away and pulls out a pair of cheap felt gloves. Putting them on, he cinches his fingers together and offers Margot the boost she's looking for to get a good view inside the window.

"Just don't take too long, yeah?"

Margot
"I'm pretty sure they had a couple of crossover books, didn't they?"

Margot tugged her scarf down off her head and shook her hair loose from where the garment pinned it down.  After hastily tucking it behind her ears, sweeping her fingers through the motion a few times to ensure it wouldn't fall back into her eyes while she was at the window, she nodded and moved to stand before Ned.  "Yeah, got it."

She put one hand on the wall and the other on his shoulder, then stepped up into his hand.  She was petite, hardly more than five feet tall if even that, and didn't weigh much more than a hundred pounds.  Lifting her up was easy, and she was good at keeping her center of balance and not wobbling and wriggling.  Soon as she was high enough up she grabbed hold of the window ledge and pulled on it enough to help relieve some of the burden of holding her weight.  Green skirt did stop at the knees, but this wouldn't be enough of a boost for modesty to come into concern.

Doing her best (and a competant job at that) to make this an easy chore and to be efficient with her time, Margot pulled her face up over the window's ledge as well and searched for whatever she could find through the curtains.

Ned
Ned's only response was a slight grunt of effort, as he hoisted Margot's small frame up with remarkable ease. She's kept steady at the window, with no further sound from below, Ned's own gaze moving to inspect their surroundings and the potential issues that might come with two young adults doing suspicious things around a Frat house recently been in the news for illegal activities.

* * * *

Margot's gaze takes a moment to adjust from the exterior to the interior but it does:

There is a small lamp on a nightstand that is responsible for the light. It's a good six feet away, explaining why the light is so dim to begin with but this helps her to evaluate the inside better. The spread of the dim light touches on the walls with huge shadows, carving up what is obviously a living room with it's well worn couches and thick carpeting into shafts of visible colour and shaded obscurity. The floor is decorated with the remains of the party excess, much of the mess probably having been cleaned hastily before the cops had arrived in an attempt to avoid notice, blame or potential issue. There's still evidence of drinking games here or there and the walls themselves sport a few party favours left behind by riled up guests.

The hallway beyond the living room, the one that leads to the front door the girls had first walked down when they arrived, is lit by an overhead hallway light. It illuminates the side of a stairwell leading up to the second floor, and part of a basement door that is cracked ajar by an inch or more of darkness.

Beyond these facts, most of the rest of the interior is shaded pretty heavily, nothing more than a big screen television hugging the opposite wall, reflecting the glare from the nightstand lamp and the hallway light in it's screen.

Margot
After taking about thirty to sixty seconds of just looking around and searching for details, Margot looked down and called quietly: "Alright, let me down."

She worked with Ned to find her way back onto the flat ground with ease.  Perhaps she was a gymnast or dancer or something like that before graduating high school-- she seemed to be able to move without trouble or doubt.  It was pretty unlikely that she was a cheerleader, though.  Didn't quite seem the sort.

Adjusting her skirt and pulling her scarf back up over her head as she spoke, Margot explained what she saw.

"There's nothing going on in there really.  Someone left the lamp on, but nothing in there looks like it was disturbed-- there's still crap on the ground and tables from when the party went sour the other week."  What she reported next, the only thing that she found especially worth mentioning, had her frowning a little.  "The basement door was ajar, though."  She clearly had little desire to go digging around in a haunted house's basement.

Ned
"Fuck that. That's how dumb white kids like us get murdered."

It's Ned's first response when Margot tells him about the Basement. The rest he seemed to be nod at, shrug through but that one got his hands up and his head shaking with an adamant sort of refusal.

"You didn't see anything in there and it says there's probably not anyone at home right now. Maybe we-"

There is a dull thump from inside. Something loud enough to breach the seal of the windows, but low enough it is almost felt more than heard. Ned's eyes widen and his lips seal into a thin line, head shaking rather furiously. He mouths the words

Nope. Nope. Nope fuckin' Train

A second thump, this one a little quieter. More distant.

Margot
After taking about thirty to sixty seconds of just looking around and searching for details, Margot looked down and called quietly: "Alright, let me down."

She worked with Ned to find her way back onto the flat ground with ease.  Perhaps she was a gymnast or dancer or something like that before graduating high school-- she seemed to be able to move without trouble or doubt.  It was pretty unlikely that she was a cheerleader, though.  Didn't quite seem the sort.

Adjusting her skirt and pulling her scarf back up over her head as she spoke, Margot explained what she saw.

"There's nothing going on in there really.  Someone left the lamp on, but nothing in there looks like it was disturbed-- there's still crap on the ground and tables from when the party went sour the other week."  What she reported next, the only thing that she found especially worth mentioning, had her frowning a little.  "The basement door was ajar, though."  She clearly had little desire to go digging around in a haunted house's basement.

Dice: 1 d10 TN4 (5) ( success x 1 )

Margot
Before he could even finish his sentence, Margot was nodding in agreement with his sentiment about how they wound up dead.  Fuck just going into the basement-- what were they even armed with?  Margot brought a pocket knife along with her but really that could only do so much, and it would do nothing against a ghost.

Whatever the next idea was going to be, it was interrupted by a thump that was low and loud enough that she seemed to feel it in her gut and chest more than actually hear it.  The fact that she saw Ned react to the noise told her that she wasn't imagining things.  A wide-eyed stare was cast back toward the house, and then to Ned again.  As he was shaking his head and silently mouthing his denial, the thump happened again.

Margot, however, furrowed her brow and thought for a second.  Felt like trying something, and hesitated at first-- this showed in her reaching a hand out toward the house, then pausing.  But something the Doc said about learning their beliefs and trying things and testing themselves rang echoing in her mind, so she pursed her lips together and finished closing the gap.

Bare fingertips touched to the brick walls of the house, and Margot lowered her head.  Her lips moved silent, offering no words but counting something off.  Her head bobbed a little with it, and she started tapping her fingertips on the wall in a pulsing rhythm.  Like Jumanji.  Or war drums.

[Arete 1: Matter/Forces Scan -- what solid matter can I find beyond the structure of the house alone, and can I sense where those thumps are coming from within the house's framework? -1 diff for tool]

Ned
(Margot's Forces/Matter scan...)

The building itself is relatively cold, no heat emanating from furnaces or boiler to keep the temperature within much above that outside. The foundation is slightly slanted northward but still holding up after decades. Deeper than that...

....Blood. Old and dead, because if it wasn't, it would be Life needed here and really? Margot's pretty familiar with it at this point. Stains of it in the house in a few places. Blooms and blossoms in flashes of insight across her brain. Bloody carpets. Bloody wallpaper...

...A sense of the Goddess lurking in the back of her mind, vaguely pleased at the discovery.

...The thump of shoes. The pressure of kinetic energy, gathered up beneath those steps. Echoes of footsteps resounding off the interior...

....Flesh. Cooling flesh leaking heat. Tucked in the basement. Another thought in her mind clarifying. Flesh doesn't register under Matter...not if it's alive...

Ned
"...You do remember what happened the last time you tried this, right?"

Ned. Devil's advocate. He stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets and turned his attention back out into the world. There was a flare of Margot's resonance, his tongue scraping under his upper teeth to get that filmy sense, that copper taste off the back of his throat. He shivered again, this time not because of the cold and took a small involuntary step away from where Margot was working.

"...I say we ditch. Or call the Doc. This shit's getting way too Friday the 13th for my taste."

Margot
Thankfully Margot was too busy with her eyes closed focusing on what she was reading within the bones of the house to see that Ned sidestepped her when her Craft began to seep and weep and cry into the air.  Her feelings might have been hurt.  She was still in the beginning stages of coming to terms with what it meant for her to have Magic, and more specifically what it meant to her.

She felt the satisfaction of the Goddess in the background, somewhere vaguely distant and best described as 'above and behind', and it made her teeth itch but she tried not to think too much about it.  Soon found that pretty easy, because the more that she learned of what was happening inside the more she had other things to worry about.

Suddenly, with a small gasp, Margot pulled her hand back from the wall and opened her eyes.  Her hand stayed up, turned around to instead press over her chest and her heart (as though to soothe the palpatations).  She turned around and looked at her partner-in-crime, and looked a tiny bit guilty, a little reluctant, but mostly worried and afraid and unsure.

"Somebody just died in there.  The killer's still there.  And other people, they've died there too."

She huffed out a breath and shook her head quickly.  "We can't call the Doc," she said just as quickly.  "Not after the other day, no.  We've got to...  Jesus, I don't know, call the cops?"

Ned
Ned stares at her for a second, then puts a pretend phone next to his ear, made out of his hand.

"Hello officers. We were walking by this frat house minding our own business, when we heard a noise inside and decided to call you. Could you come down and check out the murders going on inside? Yes we'll gladly give you our information and names for identification purposes and testify as needed being the only witnesses present..."

Ned finishes up and stares at her rather blankly.

"I am not giving the police any reason to look at me crosseyed, nor should you. I doubt the Doc would be too happy with us either and given our histories during our Awakenings-" He pauses, a hand rising to his face to scrub at the memories that drags up "-I'm not entirely sure about you, but I don't need them looking too closely at my accident  or past, thanks."

There is another series of Thumps from inside, this time a bit more prolonged. Like something tumbling down a set of steps. Ned glances up at the window, a frown on his face, breath a white mist infront of him.

"So we walk away..." That...isn't sitting right with Ned. Not entirely, anyway. Practicality vs....what? Morality? They had talked about this briefly. What they were going to do with this newfound power and perspective. What a wonderful opportunity to put that to the test, yes?

Fuck you, Destiny. Fuck. You.

Margot
Margot looked displeased, and understandably so, at Ned's miming out the call to 911 dispatch.  While he was still going she gave him the middle finger and shook her head, waving hands both at him now dismissively and turning away to look back at the house instead.  She was looking not just at the window with the lamp any longer, but also to the left and the right-- looking for window wells or perhaps a hint of old wooden cellar doors.

When she heard more thumps she looked up again, then back to Ned.

So we walk away.

It was the best idea.  They didn't know what kind of a weapon that person in there had, they had no way to contend with a ghost let alone somebody who was murdering people, perhaps possessed by a soul trapped with original violent sin in this old Victorian home.  It couldn't possibly be worth their lives, solving the mystery of this murder house and trying to set things right for those within.  But...

"No."  It didn't sit right with him, and clearly it didn't sit right with Margot either.  She shook her head and looked around the house again.  "Maybe we can...."  Then her eyes went alight with a thought-- an idea.  "Could we fuck up the gas inside from the gas meter?"

Ned
"....We are those white kids, folks sitting in movie theatres talk about."

Ned was scrubbing his face with his glove-worn hands, sighing loudly in the process, before pulling them away to look at her.

"No. I wouldn't know how to do that and we'd have to be inside to actually have the gas leak inside. We could also most likely, explode ourselves with that sort of thing which...I think I'd find unpleasant." He's staring up at the House itself, inspecting windows. The one they were standing under is the only one he can see on this side of the House with a light on. His frown deepens.

"There's probably a back door to a place this big?" He says it uncertainly. So far, sneaking in the back was as far as his plan went. How they were meant to take down a potential Murderer, or a ghost. Or something resembling a ghost-

"Can you talk to spirits? Did it try to communicate with you at all?" Does your ghost-sight power come with any sort of Texting option? They were definitely in some unknown territory here. Despite that fact, Ned is beginning to make his slowwww way around toward the back of the House.

Margot
"Are you trying to jinx us?  Stop referencing horror movies."  Margot didn't snap at him, but she did sound equal parts exasperated and pleading.  She looked anxious and jangled, and hadn't yet moved the hand that was pressed over her heart.  She couldn't get her pulse down, and she didn't need blood magic to be able to tell that about herself.  It was fluttering in her throat like a butterfly and her stomach felt sick to boot.

But they couldn't walk away.  Maybe there was a back door?

Ned began inching his way slowly around the back, and Margot hovered in place under the window for a moment before following along with.  Keeping close, like they were in a Hallowen for-pay haunted house waiting for someone in a jumpsuit and mask with a chainless chain saw to jump out and scare them.

"No, I don't think so," she said with a shake of her head.  "They still seem to be existing on a different plane or something.  I can't reach or hear through it.  It's like I'm just seeing through a reflection on a pool, or just feeling like they're there."

A pause, and then she suggested:  "Maybe it can communicate with us on its own anyways?  Haven't you ever seen those ghost-hunter shows?  They use white noise recordings to capture what they're saying and we could record with a phone..."

Ned
"I also remember the Doc rolling his eyes and giving us alcohol everytime we tried to make comparisons to television or childhood experiences. Somehow I think this is why..." Ned's made it around the side of the house to the back, where a long deck can be found with an overhanging awning. The entire back is a porch area with stone steps leading up to a wooden installation deck, with wood rails fitted into the concrete. There is indeed a backdoor, with a screen door in front and an old wooden door behind that is...oddly ajar. The hall light is visible through the crack in the door itself.

Ned stands at the corner of the stairs leading up onto the wooden porch, eyeballing the open door with a serious level of consideration for what the fuck they were about to do.

"...If it didn't communicate with you the last time I'm not inclined to think it will this time. That said....I've got no clue about this anymore than you do. If we go inside, it's because we want to stop what's happening. If it's murders, then...well, stay behind me for the most part and if it looks like trouble? We run. Tell the Doc about it and maybe he comes back here with us to sort it all out." A pause, turning to glance back at her for a moment.

"That said. You're the one with the sight. Looks like a Kitchen through the door. We go inside you're gonna need to get that Ghost-sight going, yeah? I don't want some invisible fucker giving us a hard time without at least knowing it's around."

Margot
"Ghost sight," Margot repeated, quiet and thoughtful.  It gave her an idea.  Thus far she'd only really sought echoes and vibrations and impressions.  It didn't occur to her to think of it as a more... permanent altering of her own senses.  Like strapping on goggles as opposed to sticking your head under the surface just long enough to take a peek.

She stood nearby at the corner to the stairs, leaned around Ned to look up the porch at the door left ajar.  That explained how the person got inside.

Margot shivered, but then straightened up and nodded to show her agreement to the plan he'd laid out.  They were just looking to stop whatever was happening inside to the best of their ability.  If things got hairy they were bailing, though.  They knew their limitations, and great they were.

"I've never done this before, so hang on..."

She was thinking through it as she went along, and stepped back from the stairs, around to the side of the staircase and porch platform as she did.  The pocket knife was drawn from her jacket pocket and for the second time that Ned had witnessed, she made a small nick of a cut on one of her fingers.  She had to figure out a better system than cutting herself when she needed to do magic, but she hadn't worked through that just yet.  She shut her eyes tight and smeared the blood from her finger in an arc across her brow.

[Sight of Spirits, -1 diff for tool]

Dice: 1 d10 TN4 (2) ( fail )

Ned(Dex 3 + Stealth 2 + Arcane 1: Let's be Ninjas!)

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 7, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

NedMargot's efforts to reach out and visuaize something beyond their world, the physical world, end with a sputter. Nothing but the vague tingle of that grisly sensation across the nerves, hovering briefly in the air, comes of it and Ned is left standing there expectantly only to shake his head slowly as she seems to come back to her senses and self with a negative response.

He puffs his cheeks out, exhaling slowly, gaze returning to the wooden porch and the slightly ajar backdoor through which whoever got in had wandered. He seemed to consider their situation for a moment, dancing slightly back and forth from one foot to the next. Then, with nothing more than a 'Fuck it' for a herald, Ned began to climb the wood stairs with slow and meticulous effort.

He'd make it up the steps to the screen door, puling it open with achingly, agonizingly, slow increments, the thin squeaks and metallic cranks of protest forcing him to twitch and wince in the face with every inch the door slipped open. A hand moved in to push the interior door open even further, revealing the black and white tiled normalcy of a dark kitchen, closed fridge and open cupboard doors visible from their place at the backdoor.

Ned turned back to look at Margot, brows up and a silent question on his face.

C'mon Then

Before pushing inside, a hand holding both doors open for her to slip beneath his out-stretched arm and enter without disturbing the position of the doors themselves. He'd had practice with stuff like this it would seem.

MargotShe felt the failure and knew right away that the effort hadn't worked.  There was a fizzle-- perhaps when she was stronger, perhaps in better circumstances when she was more sure of the ritual instead of testing waters...  But now, it seemed, she wouldn't be able to watch for the Ghost(s?).

It felt like an omen of things to come, and Margot stood and looked anxiously at her own hands.  Pressed her fingertip into the pad of her thumb to stop the bleeding.  Her face was pale and certainty of how poorly this was going to end was trying to rear its ugly head.  But a glance up confirmed that Ned was already climbing the stairs, and not one to be left behind Margot went along after him.  Up the porch and to the door, where she stood suspensefully while the door inched and squeaked its way open.

When he glanced back to gesture her through the open door, he'd find Margot looking like she'd seen a ghost.  Except they both knew that she wasn't-- Ned sensed that the magical engine didn't quite turn over when she cranked the ignition that time.  It was easy to understand why, though.  The prospect of being in a haunted house with a murderer was a scary one.  Not everybody was built for this kind of stuff.

Yet, even if she wasn't made of the stuff of spooky adventures, Margot still gulped and ducked down under Ned's arm and soft-foot-sneaked her way into the house.  She couldn't see anything supernaturally, but she did remember about where in the house the footsteps had gone.  Where the bleeding body would be found.

[Dexterity 4 + Stealth 0 (damnit she's so bad at this) +1 diff, WP]

Dice: 4 d10 TN7 (2, 4, 6, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

NedThe Cupboards were all open.

A classic sort of look, it left one considering what the hell someone in their right mind (or drunk one) would be doing leaving the cupboards open, but low and behold there they were. Not much was found within, evidence perhaps of the lack of 'cooks' within the house, while the prolifieration of pizza boxes stuffed, packed and rolled up in the sizeable recycling bin off to the side of the double sink, told stories of why those cupboards rarely held anything. Or were opened.

The Tile was slightly greasy underfoot, not quite slippery but not quite clean either, forcing the pair to step a little more carefully, to avoid squeaking noises underfoot.

The hall light stared down at the wooden hallway, glared like it was watching them, while the basement door stood slightly open as it had since Margot had opened it. The Kitchen was at the end of the Hallway. They had a clean view of the front door from where they stood.

Ned just looked around, lips purse and hands tucking into his pockets. He took a few moments to survey the situation before his head began to shake in slow, steady turns.

"....Where did you say the bodies were?" A very low whisper he had to lean in close to Margot's ear to be heard.



* * * * *



Ned's answer comes in the form of a thump clear and precise. From below, audible and tactile underfoot. He nods, once, biting his upper lip and once again mouthing his immediate thoughts

Fuccckkk meeeeee



MargotThe floors beneath their feet were greasy, but Margot had no fear of slipping and even though she never had need to sneak around before (well, before this week anyways) she still managed to walk quietly and gently across the tiles.  Being naturally sure of foot and light enough to not make floorboards creak as much had its own advantages.  She was following Ned's lead, clearly, and stopped when he did, looking between the light and the kitchen and the basement door.

She was staring at the cabinets and wondering whether they were flung open by a ghost or rifled through by whatever maniac was in the house with them when she felt Ned lean in and speak a bare-whisper into her ear.  She leaned aside a little, turned her head to answer him, but stopped to listen instead to the heavy thump that came from below.

Margot swallowed hard while Ned bit his lip and mouthed a curse and begroan silently into the air.  She waffled, standing on the spot for the moment while trying to decide upon the next move.  She looked around for anything that might serve for self defense, but figured that the small knife in her coat pocket was still probably her best bet.

After a few ticks of the second hand had passed, Margot nodded toward the basement entrance, then moved away from Ned's side and toward the door.  She reached for the knob and twisted it quietly, aiming to close the door without the latch making sound to give her away and alert whoever was downstairs that she was going to be barring them in.

NedNed slips off to the side as Margot steps forward, eyes focusing on something against the Kitchen wall.

The 'Nancy Drew' of the moment, moves carefully across the Kitchen floor, the gentle grunt of wood beneath the linoleum, serving as a hurrying cast to movement, while the stress and stereotype of their situation demanded silence alongside of it. Eventually, the two begin to go at odds with one another, adrenaline demanding speed while fear spoke of silence.

It all comes to a head, as Margot clasps the latch, the faint creak of metal audible to the both of them. There is a simple, push button lock on the fake-gold knob (no doubt installed for the inevitable pranks that would ensue, locking some poor pledge or house brother downstairs to plead for release). Margot manages to slip the door closed, a rather ominously loud

Click

rupturing the silence. A moment later and there is the shuffling scuttle of footfalls below them...on the stairs...sound rushing like cannonfire...and the door, locked with a quick push of the button, thuds thunderously under the tumbling crunch of a body striking the other side. There is a grunt of effort, followed by a shrill, male voice on the otherside, beginning a low-toned howl of discord. Unhinged, would be the best word for it.

Ned appears again, in the entrance to the kitchen, clasping a Golf Putter in both hands, eyes wild and wide as he stares at Margot.

"What the Fuck?!"

Except he isn't looking at her, but at the interior of the living room. There's blood on the walls, over the large Television screen. Near invisible in the soft and inconsistent light of the nightstand lamp and the hallway fixture, but visible nonetheless. It's scrawled into a dripping message, with three jagged words.

Chelsea Deserved Better

Ned(WP: Cause Fuccckkkkkk the Shining!)

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 5 )

MargotCLOSE DEM TAGS

Margot[Ahem.  WP!]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 6, 9) ( success x 2 )

Ned(...What the Fuck?)

Margot

Margot[test]

MargotThough the door closed quietly as to be expected (the soft 'click' of the latch settling into place went unnoticed, it had seemed), the louder 'clack' that followed when she locked the door alerted whoever was downstairs that they were being foiled.  When the footsteps came charging up the stairs Margot backpedaled from the door and bumped into the wall behind her-- not hard enough to bang herself up, but she was indeed startled by the pounding on the door and it made it all the harder to consider her next steps from there.

Then Ned came barrelling into the room with a golf club (of all goddamn things) grasped in his hands, looking wild and a little afraid perhaps.  Margot stared at him in bewilderment, but then her attention followed his gaze into the living room.

"Oh my god..."

The blood on the walls was terrible, terrifying.  She couldn't see what was causing it, but she could see this.  It was manifesting on their side, bleeding through with macabre rage.

What was worse was how it sang to some deep dark corner of her where the Avatar was linked up.

It would probably occur first to Ned that something should be done about the guy in the basement before he broke his way through the doorknob.  Margot was just managing to stomach and process the message scrawled out for them to see.

Ned".Chelsea Dodds."

It's Ned's first words as the 'man' behind the door continues to moan, softer now, a steady stream of smaller thumps and bumps striking the door, with none of the same force as the initial strike. He's...well, on his phone. The golf cub is resting on one shoulder, his eyes darting from the door to the glow of the screen, a frown crossing his face. If this were a movie, he would be the calm and collected jock looking to reassure everyone that they weren't completely fucked but in actuality, they are indeed, completely-

"-20 years old. University of Denver. Three years ago." Ned lifts his phone up to take a picture of the blood on the wall, the flash illuminating more of the living room interior, where the blood has been lathered and slicked across the upper ballasts and wallpaper with generous effort. Enough that at least one person was probably not among the living any longer.

"According to Google, she filed a case with the police and the school board against this Frat House for allegedly being sexually assaulted by several of it's members." Ned's frown deepened. "Charges were dropped. Lack of witnesses or evidence. Police say she was intoxicated at the time-" Ned's scrolling further along his phone. "-and she committed suicide a month later." His gaze lifts to inspect the wall and then around toward the door where the soft thumps have receded again, footsteps climbing back down the stairwell and into the basement.

"...No wonder this place got shut down. Couldn't afford another incident in the papers..."

He glanced at Margot, a pained expression on his face.

"What do you want to do, Nancy?"

MargotWith some hesitancy Margot moved away from the basement door and back into the kitchen.  Other than oozing blood and being ominous overall, the living room scenario didn't seem to be harming them or changing in any way.  All the same, Margot moved cautiously, keeping an eye on it as she sought out a dining chair or stool if available (and if not, anything else that may serve the purpose, such as a recycling bin) to bar the basement door.

Granted, the groans and thumps about the locked door had quieted down, and then footsteps told her that he'd retreated back into the basement again.  Only once she'd scooted something over in front of the door did she go to join Ned.  He wanted to know what she figured they should do next, and she shook her head.

"I don't know...  We have two options, the way I see it.  We can stick around and try to put to rest whatever is haunting this house-- see if we can find any other deaths, put forth any justices..."  She looked toward the front door before continuing.

"Or we can call 911 about suspicious noises and get the hell out of here.  Let the cops find the asshole in the basement."

Ned"The first one sounds like you're auditioning for a role in a Harry Potter movie..." Ned offers, stuffing his phone away and eyeballing the door, golf club still held over his shoulder.

"The second sounds reasonable and at the same time, utterly devoid of solving the problem. Nothing says ghostly won't just stay here haunting the place, when they eventually re-open it for someone else, after all of this blows over. Or the place just gets abandoned or turned into something else or knocked down for a strip mall or some University Cafeteria. Ghosty possibly remains behind on all of it, continuing to do well-" He eyes the living room again.

"This." A hand lifts to indicate it all. Silence once more from below, the moaner having moved far enough away or quieted down or both.

MargotA light pink flush spread over Margot's otherwise pale face when accused of sounding like she belonged in the Harry Potter universe, and she looked away-- from Ned, from the living room carnage, and out a window instead.  But the second option, while more practical, wouldn't solve the problem.

She scowled some, and when she spoke again her voice was tight and high from the stress of the situation.

"Well then we'd better pack our goddamn trunks and climb aboard the Hogwarts Express, pal, because you shot down the only other option I had."  Feeling that his idea with the golf club might not be the worst one, she fished the little pocket knife from her pocket and looked down at it as she played with the blade release with her fingertips.

"Unless we aren't the ones who are supposed to solve the problem.  I mean, what can we do?"  Blade locked out from the knife, Margot looked back over to Ned thoughtfully.  "We can look for... somebody else.  Another Awakened.  One who's better with spirits than me."

Ned"That's a thought. Though how long before someone comes back here? Or whether the one in the basement doesn't manage to get out someho-"

Ned jolts slightly as the thump comes again, from beneath them. A bit heavier than the last time. Struck harder, whatever was being struck. He hisses slightly under his breath and pauses in place to stare straight ahead, at some point just infront of him. Thinking.

"X-ray vision." He says it matter-of-factly, turning to look at her with a perked brow. "Maybe we get a clue as to what's going on without actually...ya know, opening the door for Jason Voorhees to destroy our immortal souls?" He didn't sound nervous or agitated, but he was far from certain at that.

Margot"Alright," Margot conceded.  She figured that what they needed to be concerned about immediately what down in the basement anyways.  It would be good for them to know precisely what all was down there.

The X-ray vision was likely something similar to what she'd done outside the house, or so she figured.  So she gestured with her hand in a 'go ahead' fashion.

You this time, it said.

She didn't have the best track record, after all.

Ned
(Forces 1: X-ray Vision. Difficulty 4 - 1 for Tools)

Dice: 1 d10 TN3 (5) ( success x 1 )

Ned
Ned begins to rub his hands together, forcefully, the golf club set off to one side in the effort. He's staring around at the Kitchen and through the hallway at the blood on the walls, but always with his hands scrubbing infront of him. Heat begins to build and he focuses his attention on his hands, the warmth bleeding up his arms and into his muscles which steadily cringe against the repetitive motion.

At last, he exhales, loudly and slowly, before lifting his hands up to cover either eye. The heat blooms over the sensitive organs, blisters of colour flooding his suddenly darkened vision.

He removes his hands a few moments later, blinking openly at the air. His eyes have gone glassy, vision heavily obscured, enough that his arms wheel outward slightly, unused to the sudden shift and change in dimensional perspective. There is a brief glance at Margot-

"Gah! Sorry!" Follow by a swift snap of his eyes closed and head shunting downward and away from her, shaking rather abruptly in the process. "Uhhh...one...one sec..."

One eye creeps open, peering at the ground. Ned steps to one side as if to give himself further room to 'see', the other eye opening a moment later to join with the first, a slow scan of the floor and presumably what's going on below them revealing-

"Two bodies. Skeleton's at least anyway. Vaguely outlined in flesh. There's a third as well, it's moving-"

Thump from below.

"Running into one of the walls just below us?" He sounds confused, hands already wringing together infront of him, head leaning out to look over the gesture. "I don't think it's....uhhh....I'm not sure it's alive either." Ned's confusion grows, head tilting to one side.

"You said you didn't feel anything living inside the house when we were outside?"

Margot
Watching curiously, Margot stayed put inside the haunted frat house's kitchen not too far off from where Ned was standing.  Trying not to look at the still-bleeding walls or the message scrawled out, and instead focusing on Ned and his process to unlock Sight.

She remained quiet and respectful, largely, and only interrupted (if you could call it that) to reach out and touch the wrist of one of his wheeling arms.  He wasn't that close to hitting her on accident, but all the same she nudged his arm away to be safe.  The apology got a shake of a head, a silent it's fine, and then he was peering at the floor and what was happening below.  She couldn't see through the floor so she listened instead.

'Thump', went the person down below, and Ned explained what he found.  Two bodies, plus the one person moving around.  But he couldn't detect life, and that had Margot frowning thoughtfully.

"I wasn't really... looking for life especially.  I just registered the two bodies-- I think the same ones you found.  This person, though, I just sensed them through their footsteps.  They didn't feel like...."  She twirled her hand in the air and, for a moment, looked incredibly aggrivated with the fact that she had to keep floundering for words.  Explaining what she felt through the craft was diffucult.  She was smart, but she was no poet or wordsmith.

"I was feeling for the rooms and items within them.  The bodies weren't alive, so I picked them up as "items".  I didn't pick this third person up because they're not an "item".  They have to be something else.  If not alive, maybe.... in between?"  As that dawned upon her she stared at Ned with disbelief.

"Fuck, Ned, are we talking about the 'z' word here?  A zombie?"

Ned
(Forces 1: X-ray to Thermal. Diff 4-1)

Dice: 1 d10 TN3 (10) ( success x 1 )

Ned
"....Fucckkkk..."

It's Ned's version of confirmation. Margot's either hit on something or suggested something that he hadn't considered and it's got him a bit spooked. Enough that he's sucking in a sharp breath, eyes returning to normal with a quick blink. He shakes his head sharply to clear the last of the imagery, before turning to look at her.

"I....wait-" Ned's doing his hand thing again. He rubs, scrubs and puts his palms over his eyes for a few moments before releasing them again. This time, it's less glassy and more of a red haze across the whites and pupils. He blinks and turns to regard Margot, then down at his own hand for a second-

"Like waves. Pulses of heat-" And then down toward the basement floor again.

"...I'm not getting anything from below. No moving heat signatures. That means....Yeah. He's moving but he isn't alive. Not like you or I. Sooooo....Zombie." Ned pauses. Registering exactly what he just said. Blinking a few times, several of which eventually switch off the red haze and return him to his normal calm brown.

"....Ok so we have a zombie. We just don't know what sort of zombie...Braindead? Dawn of the Dead? Bloodpuke? Voodoo?" A glance at her.

"....We don't kill it, could it start the apocalypse? Or...will that just piss off Chelsea some more?"

Margot
While Ned scanned for heat signatures under the floorboards and throughout the house, Margot anxiously paced a four-step radius within the kitchen while trying to think.  If it was a zombie, it could be the kind to start an apocalypse as Ned wondered aloud.  It could be voodoo, it could be a slave risen by something even more powerful that they just weren't prepared to contend with.

"I don't know," she said to his thinking out loud.  "At least whoever-- whatever's down there, we won't have to worry about feeling guilty if we do need to, y'know...  Put it down."  She came to a stop facing the basement door, folding her arms over her chest and fixing her thoughtful frown upon it as well.

"I doubt it's the plague-kind of zombieism.  I mean, it's got to be tied to the ghost and the haunting.  Maybe it's a possessed corpse?  Probably-- hopefully not contagious."  She turned her head to look from the door back to Ned again, keeping her arms folded and hugged tight around her chest.

"Maybe we should ask the ghosts what it is they want?"

Ned
"Ask how? I get the feeling if it could understand us, it'd probably have made itself known by this point."

Ned isn't dismissive, as much as he is agitated. He's pacing as the Heat-trails wear off, hands still wringing in front of him. The Kitchen linoleum squeaks slightly with every other step he takes. His lips are tucked between his teeth, lost in thought for a moment when-

Thump from below them. Hard enough this time it's a audible.

Ned stops pacing to look at Margot. Stare, really.

"Or maybe you're right....If the ghost hasn't been around. If we have a Zombie downstairs...maybe it possessed the Body. It's already proven it can possess the living so why not the dead?" Another pause, head tilting, eyes falling to the ground when-

Thump.

"-Or maybe it took up someone Living....so it could do what it tried to do with you and Makayla the first time. Use the host. Kill who needs killing. Then kill the Host while still in it." Another inhale. He walks over and picks up the Golf club again. Comforts.

"Longer we're here, more at risk of discovery. More to explain and clarify to the wrong people. Contagious or not, that thing could bring up way too many questions about strange and unnatural things....we put it down and...it's just a someone going nuts and causing a whole lot of normal, human tragedy."

Margot
It was amazing that it took up to this moment for her to see it, but in looking over the scene in which she stood Margot realized, at least to a small degree, how in over their heads they were overall.  She had been pacing earlier, but now it was Ned's turn to do so, wringing his hands as he went.  Between the anxiety and directionlessness that the both of them were putting off and the dark, shut-down house around them, optimism at their own ability to solve the problem at hand.

When it came down to it, though, action had to occur.  No more inaction, they didn't have the luxury of standing around and talking strategy any longer.

Lips pressed together in grim determination, Margot nodded.

"Maybe we'll see more about what the ghosts want after we've taken care of this..."  She didn't sound much like she believed it, but at least she hoped.  "But like you said, if worse comes to worse it's just... bad humanity."

Which was her way of saying if worse comes to worst then we fucking bail and let the policement make their own assumptions when they get here.  As though that could qualify as a happy thought, she took a breath before moving the chair from where she braced it in front of the basement door, then held onto the doorknob.

She paused, looking to Ned, and widened her eyes significantly.  "Ready?  One... two..."

Then the knob was turned, the push-lock clicked, and the door swung open.

Ned
"Ready...Wait-"

Ned had listened. He'd nodded, because this was quickly growing out of their ability to handle. Nerves were frayed and neither of them was going to be thinking straight inside of another ten minutes. So perhaps that's why Ned hadn't given more thought to planning this out then the immediate 'Open Door. Face the Devil' policy adopted.

He doesn't say much else, after Margot's yanked the door open. Just lunges forward to grab her by the shoulder and shovel them both into the hallway, away from the Kitchen. Narrow confines, he pushes away from Margot as the basement door swings open and a rather loud

Haaaarrrrhhhhhhh comes bursting up from the basement, followed awkwardly by the scrape-step-thump of scattered footfalls, racing to...and then up, the stairs.

Ned squares off in the entrance to the living room, leaving Margot in the hallway and it's a split second of preparation, his eyes meeting hers, that says.

This is it

Before the basement door, on it's way to swinging slowly closed again, bursts back and slams into the siding for the kitchen entrance. The moaning shape of a frat boy, dressed in blood, a football jersey, raggedly clinging to his rather muscular torso, clambers into view, thrusting through the door to slam into the hallway's opposite wall. His skin is pale, lack of bloodflow making him sallow, head a bloodied mess of dark red and exposed patches of cracked bone. His eyes are wild and vacant at once, staring down the hallway at Margot, hands scraping and clutching at the wall he'd thrown himself into on emerging.

He stares, moaning loudly

Haarrrrgggghhhh

And Ned responds with little more than a

"...Fuck..." and a firming of his grip on the Golf club.

Margot
Soon as she had the door open Margot felt hands clamp down on her shoulders and haul her backward.  She wheeled back along with Ned-- thankfully they were the only two upstairs and he wasn't exactly sneaking up on her, otherwise she may have screamed to be seized and pulled.  Thankfully she managed to keep the desire to scream muffled down and tucked into the hallway along with Ned.

Well, temporarily at least.  Once he'd set Margot where he wanted her, Ned moved toward the living room where he'd be out of the immediate line of sight from the basement door.  He held the golf club like it would have been a broadsword in another century and waited.

Margot, in the meanwhile, held onto her little pocket knife with one hand and held her other hand against the wall to brace herself steady.  She listened to the thundering of heavy feet up the stairs, to the moaning sound like it were the roar of an engine to a car that just didn't want to run anymore.  When she saw the blood-caked frat-boy slam into the hallway wall, Margot stiffened.  When that meaty head swung and dead eyes locked onto her, she made a quiet noise of despair but didn't move.

Her palm felt sweaty in its grasp on the knife, and she realized all at once that the little blade may have been helpful against a living thing, but this reanimated body probably wouldn't stop at a cut artery alone.

Ned
(Dead Jock: 5+...)

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )

Margot
[Init + 7!]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (5) ( fail )

Ned
Ned: 7 +...)

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )

Ned
(Order of Combat:



Ned (Higher Dex bonus)

Dead Jock

Margot.



Post in reverse!)

Margot
[Defensive action!  Margot's in no place to do any attacking at this exact moment so we'll default to a dodge]

Ned
Dead Jock:

Staring. It's what it did best. The eyes didn't blink, caked with blood around and over. The arms, thick with workouts done in life, seem to twitch and spasm in some approximation of life. Feet, dragging in heavy winter boots, turn It toward Margot in the hallway, mouth hanging open, drooling that strange sound as it lunges toward her.

Initial Action: Grapple Margot

Ned
Ned



While Ned steps forward with a restrained grunt, watching the Zombie swing into view past the Living room entrance. Two steps (no dribbling) and the Golf putter is swung upward in a vertical arc, intent on taking the Zombie beneath the chin.



(Dex 3 + Melee 2. Diff 6. 1 Willpower spent)

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 4, 7, 8) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Ned
(Damage: Strength 3 + 2 Successes)

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 4, 5, 6) ( success x 1 )

Ned
(Zombie Soak)

Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 8) ( success x 1 )

Ned
(Dead Jock: Grapple check. Strength 3 + Brawl 1  on Margot)

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (3, 8, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )

Margot
[Dodge!  Dex 4 + Athletics 2]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 5, 5, 6, 10) ( success x 2 )

Margot
[Grapple Resist!  Strength 2 + Athletics 2]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 4, 8) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Ned
Golf Clubs were not meant for Zombie Offensives. Ned swings broadly and connects solidly with the Jock's head, which ha already sprouted damage from some unknown time ago. No sooner has it connected, however than the poor grade metal (frat boys would not spend much on their putters) bends sharply in Ned's hand, leaving behind a vague streak in the blood running over the Zombie's features. Ned is cursing loudly, when the Dead Jock goes barrelling past him and into Margot.

For her part, Margot attempts to pull out of the way, lunging backward with a half-turned heel. Her hands come up as the Jock finds her hat and a chunk of hair beneath it, the other clutching at her jacket near the shoulder, hauling her to one side, both slamming forcefully into the narrow hallway wall.

(WP roll for Margot's PTSD. She's now Grappled by the Zombie. Same Initiative)

Margot
Though she hadn't necessarily volunteered to be bait for the zombie, it really did just make sense.  Ned was bigger than her (most people were), and was weilding the golf club.  Plus she already knew that she was fast and wily, she would probably have a better chance of slipping through the assailant's fingers and away from nubby, bloody grabbing hands if need be.

This was all put to the test right away.  As the zombie came shambling up the hallway toward her, Margot's eyes went wide and she leaned back, taking one small step backward.  Then in came Ned with the golf club, and when she heard the club crack! on the zombie's chin she felt a moment of relief.  Yes!  He struck true!

The victory was short-lived, though, perhaps a second long if even that.  It soon registered to her that the zombie didn't stop moving at all, and the golf club was differently shaped in Ned's hands.  She had just enough time to realize that she needed to move to be just a little too late.  The zombie-fratboy grabbed at her, and though Molly was quick on her feet and twisted around and started to duck away it wasn't quite enough.  She felt herself jerked backward by her hair and shoulder alike and let out a cry as she went toppling sideways into the wall along with the cool, bloodied body.

[Willpower!]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 6, 9) ( success x 2 )

Margot
[When the flight's been taken out of your fight-or-flight options....  Margot will try throwing her head back to skull-smash the zombie's face.  Hopefully teeth don't carry the zombie virus.]

Ned
Dead Jock

The moan came again, thunderous in Margot's ears, hands clutched at shoulders, twisting her jacket up awkwardly. One hand rises to grasp at her neck, intent on squeezing, throttling, crushing.

(Vice grip on Margot's neck)

Ned
Ned

He lunges forward, cursing the entire time, the bent golf club in his hands, the crooked length used instead as a pry bar, intention? Get it under the chin and pull him back and away from Margot.

(Grapple on Dead Jock: Rear attack -2 diff. Strength 3 + Brawl 2)

Dice: 5 d10 TN4 (2, 6, 7, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )

Ned
(Dead Jock Resist)

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )

Ned
(Margot is released from the Grapple, while Dead Jock struggles with the Golf club Ned's holding while behind him.)

Margot
[Sweeping instead!  Dex 4 + Brawl 2]

Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (3, 8, 8, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 5 )

Ned
The pair seem to be getting their feet in this.

The Dead Jock has hold of Margot, seemingly intent on choking her, when Ned lunges in behind him, hauling the dead weight up bodily with grit teeth and a muted growl beneath his breath. He holds it place with the golf club bending further around the creature's neck, who reaches up almost out of some odd reflex to clutch at the metal garrote.

This is the tableau, when Margot turns in place, some instinctive flutter flashing across her thoughts. She goes blank for a second (A goddess, smiling...) and turns in place, stumbling to one knee and kicking backward with a leg.

The Dead Jock goes down in a tumble, head against the hallway wall, legs tangled by the opposite wall and his position. The Jock doesn't waste any time of surprise. Already fumbling to right himself with grunts and high pitched whines.

(New Initiative. Dead Jock is prone.)

Ned
(Ned 7+...)

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )

Ned
(Dead Jock: 5 +...)

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )

Margot
[Init + 7!]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )

Ned
(Posting Order:

Margot

Ned

Dead Jock)



Dead Jock

Struggling to get to his feet and lunge up at the pair of them with grasping hands, the Jock makes a grab for Ned's pant legs.

(Grapple Ned)

Ned
Ned

Ned's doing his hand rubbing again, eyes studying the Zombie on the ground, trying to get back to it's feet.

(Forces 1 + Life 1: Pressure needed to snap the thing's neck)

Margot
tMargot was pulled by her coat and her hair.  She felt the hand at her hair creeping around toward her neck and had enough time to start to panic in her heart when in swooped Ned with a twisted metal bar that used to be a golf club and a lot of determination.  He'd hooked the thing around the neck with the club and pulled back hard like reins.  This freed Margot up to move of her own free will once more.

While initially she had been scrambling for escape, trying to take the path less aggressive and more defensive, there came a moment when you could fly no longer and had to fight.  Plus, she couldn't leave Ned here to do all the work.  So she dropped herself down onto one knee and lashed a leg backward.  This moment, for some reason, was one where she shone.  Perhaps her Goddess of War was trying to show support for her apprentice's decision to join the frey, for her leg collided with neat strength, speed, and precision into the zombie-jock's legs.

There was a lot of thumping and struggling when the zombie hit the ground, somehow managing not to squash the hell out of either of the young people fighting against it.  Though she wasn't quick on the uptake last time, this time around Margot was moving with a more familiar kind of quickness.  She scrambled up onto her feet and barely took a second to assess the situation before picking up a foot and stomping it downward toward the once-jock's head.

[Dexterity 4 + Brawl 2]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 4, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )

Margot
[Strength 2 + 1 suxx + 1 kick bonus]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (3, 9, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )

Ned
(Dead Jock Soak...)

Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 10, 10) ( success x 2 )

Ned
(Hangman's Sight: Forces 1 + Life 1. 4 - 1 for Tools)

Dice: 1 d10 TN3 (7) ( success x 1 )

Ned
(Dead Jock grapple at Ned: +2 Diff for being Prone)

Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (4, 4, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )

Ned
(Ned Resist)

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 5, 5, 8) ( success x 1 )

Ned
The two Apprentices come to stand over the dead Jock who flounces around stuck awkwardly between the two walls of the narrow hallway. Neither gives it much room to move or wriggle around, though it tries with the same level of disconnect it approaches all other things in it's (un)life.

Margot's heel rises up to stamp on the creature's head, which scrapes down the wall sharply, taking a few strands of bloodied blond hair with it and opening the savage head wound it is sporting a bit wider. Margot can see the bone of it's skull.

Ned meanwhile, covers his eyes once more, heat flushing across his vision, shfiting from the visual spectrum to the biological x-ray he needed to localize the jock's neck angle and the level of pressure needed to be applied and where, to snap it cleanly.

He glances down at the Jock, eyes focusing on the neck, as Margot lifts her foot back, just in time for the creature to turn sharply, head fetched against the wall, a hand lashing out to grab a solid hold of Ned's shin and pants. The apprentice holds it together admirably, restraining a full throated yell of surprise and a back peddle onto his ass, in favour of stepping back, stretching the connection between him and the Zombie as thin as it will get.

"Fuckin'-...The Neck, just behind it's ear. Kick there!"

He yells it at Margot, trying to shake the thing off his leg.

(Jock Zombie 1 Bashing. New Declares!)

Ned
Dead Jock

Try to squeeze and tear Ned's leg off.

Ned
Ned

Still standing, Ned grabs hold of the living room archway siding, intent on ripping his leg free however that needs to happen.

Margot
[Follow Ned's Advice:  Dex 4 + Brawl 2, +2 dice for insight from Ned, -2 diff (prone), +1 diff called shot (WP)]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 6, 6, 7, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 7 ) [WP]

Margot
[Damage: Strength 2 + 6 suxx + 2 for Called Shot]

Dice: 10 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 5, 5, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )

Ned
There is a sickening

Crunch

Vaguely high pitched with little to no echo, as Margot's heel comes down at just the right angle. The Jock's head flattens against the wall, while the body tilts to a hard right angle and a blood smear scrapes down the wallpaper, when he slides with a grim whimper into immobility.

Ned rips his leg free easily, breathing a little hard, eyes drifting back to normal from the vague green haze they were of a moment ago, to stare down at the body and then up at Margot. He quirks a half-grin, adrenaline making a bit goofy.

"Good shot, Van damme."

The Dead Jock twitches slightly, stares back toward the kitchen, head a bloodied mess and body, a contorted slump in the hallway. 200 plus pounds of dead weight between them but...at least he wasn't going anywhere.

Margot
Though her first attempt to kick the undead jock in the head didn't do much more besides knock some extra skin off its skull, it did lodge the half-flailing body between the floor and the hallway wall.  Ned had started rubbing his hands together to generate the heat that helped him to See, and during that time the meatbag zombie snagged onto his leg.

Margot stood for a second, looking around frantically for something that might help, but then Ned was calling for her to get the neck.  Kick behind the ear.  She didn't have much time to look up at Ned, but she did listen to him.

Once more, the leg came up.  Once more it came down, and this time it was as clean and precise a strike as it had been when she swept the legs out from under the zombie.  The heel of her foot struck precisely where it needed so she both heard and felt the wet snap when its spine gave way under the pressure.

Though somewhere above and within a bloody-black-toothed smile spread with satisfaction, Margot's own face was pale and frantic.  Her breathing was quick and shallow when she stepped back from the twitching mess of a body that was left behind, and she only looked away from it when Ned grinned and complimented her shot.  She blinked up at him, then exhaled and relaxed some when she did, grinning a little back.  "Thanks."

She looked back down at the zombie, with its still-staring eyes and occasional twitches.  Stared for a moment, tipped her head like she was finding the zombie's line of sight, and then looked back to the kitchen as she spoke.

"So, there's that.  Maybe we should check the bodies in the basement but that sounds like a Bad Idea with a big B and big I.  Things in basements with zombies swallow souls."

Ned
"....Done....All Done..."

The voice that emerges from the Zombie's mouth, is female. Distant, echoing, as if spoken from across some cavern or gulf. The Zombie's eyes and face remain slack and forward, staring at the Kitchen nearby. Ned's reaction is a brief start and a step back from the body, staring newly aghast at it, hands up into fists and ready for another fight.

"....Uhhh...." He glances up at Margot, brow perked, face a mask of uncertainty and bubbling dread.

Margot
The voice issuing from the body didn't match.  First Margot was startled that it was using language at all, then it occurred to her that the voice was lighter and higher.  Female-- distant, but not monstrous.  Ned brought his fists up reflexively and looked at her, unsure and worried at this new development.

He'd find Margot looking unsure as well, but more thoughtful and less steeped in dread.  She flicked an eyebrow up as though to communicate something to him, then bent her knees and stooped down nearer to the paralyzed vessel that the ghost was riding within.  Still outside of biting and grabbing distance, though.  Just in case.

"If it's all done, you can go now."  She spoke with the tone of someone who was using a tin can and string for the first time-- uncertain of how well it would work, and unsure that the mechanics of this method of communication could be trusted at all.  Still, she added:  "You'll get to rest."  Like that would be the bonus lure that would entice the spirit to cross over.

Ned
"...They needed to pay...."

Timorous. On the verge of tears. The voice emerges and the lower lip of the Zombie's ruined face trembles slightly. It continues to stare at a space ahead of it, seemingly ignorant of the pair of apprentices. Just the voice speaks and registers.

"...For what they did? They needed to pay, all three of them..."

Ned's lowering his hands slowly, brow furrowing as the voice continues. A soft murmur of weeping, crosses the Zombie's lips, that hollowed out distance making it all the more vulnerable. Ned's gaze lifts to find Margot, eyes widening slightly, mouth working to form words at her, that he doesn't say aloud.

Chelsea Dodds?

"...Now they'll know. They'll know, won't they? Everyone will know what they did. They'll see they deserved it..." There's a question in the heat of that phrasing. A sneer on the lips of the zombie, that isn't quite angry. It's hurt. It's desperate. Clarity? Reassurance? Ned's frown deepens.

Margot
Empathy spread across Margot's face and creased her brow, softened her eyes and the corners of her mouth as well.  A hand moved from her knee, reflexively reaching out to pat and comfort when she saw that bloodied lip tremble and heard the waver and murmer of tears in the voice, the weeping of the dead and wronged.

Her eyes met Ned's again, over the dead frat boy/ghost girl's head, and she nodded her head once, just so, in agreement at what he mouthed.  It was probably Chelsea Dodds.

"Absolutely," she agreed with the ghost, to comfort and reassure.  "There's no question what they did.  Their skeletons will be their guilt."

Ned
"....Good..."

Something final. Something firm. The trembling stops. The mouth slackens slightly.

"Good...They should know and with them, no one else will suffer..."

Ned leaned against the nearby wall, eyeing the body infront of them. He clears his throat, a touch awkwardly and sucks in a breath.

"...Blood and bodies. Plenty of evidence. Even if-" He shakes his head. "They'll sort it out. This place will get shut down. Congrats, yeah?"

"...For good? Shut down for good?"

Margot
Margot's gaze hopped back up to Ned when he cleared his throat and spoke up.  A smile barely touched the corners of her mouth-- not an obvious one, but a softening overall of an otherwise serious and somber expression.

Shut down for good?

"It will be."  She said this with confidence and certainty, like it was something she'd already seen the documents for.

With a look to her companion, she added.  "For one reason or another."

Ned
"....Good. That's so good..."

There is a comforting there. The echo seems to drift free on the last few words and the distance closes. There is no light or brilliant or happy declaration of humming choirs. No halleleujahs or amens or benedictions from on high. There is simply a slacking of that zombified face. A listlessness that creeps into a body when it finally knows it is dead and the lingering aftermath of suffocation left over from Ned's 'Solving' efforts.

He stares at the body, head tilting aside, trying to gauge the look on the face.

"I...think...it's done?" A boot toe moves forward to nudge the body, which slumps forward onto the face with a wet slap. Motionless and unresponsive. Ned steps back slightly and sucks in a breath, glancing up at Margot.

"Who needs proton packs?"

Margot
As the body went slack and the un-life that it once held left, Margot breathed out to calm herself some.  It was good, and it was over.  She was just straightening up and finding her feet again when Ned nudged at the body and joked about Ghostbusters. Margot gave him a brief stare, then shook her head a little and looked down at the zombie body once more.

"Assholes who aren't as good at this as we are."

Then, a little quieter, she gestured toward the back door.

"Can we go now?"

Ned
"...Yeah." Ned sobered a little, coughing into his sleeve and sniffing loudly. He looks up, around them, at the blood on the walls, which had stopped flowing, still showing it's message. The police would come through and find all the details, and probably conclude for sanity's sake, some sort of murder-suicide with the other two frat bodies in the basement.

"...Yeah we can go." He offers her a hand over the body in the hallway, before turning to the Kitchen. A quick peek out the door to see if the coast was clear and then Ned is outside, holding the door open for the younger 'Witch' and the pair are down the stairs and of into the wintry once more.